For the second consecutive season, an Edmonton Oiler is tied for the rookie scoring lead in the NHL. This time, it’s Nail Yakupov, who scored a hat-trick in Edmonton’s final game to tie Florida’s Jonathan Huberdeau with 31 points. Additionally, with 17 goals Yakupov sits alone at the top of the rookie goal-scoring charts.

The NHL’s schedule is almost finished, with Ottawa playing Boston tonight. The Senators’ Cory Conacher has 11 goals and 28 points, so with a four-point night he could move into the scoring lead, but right now the smart money is that Yakupov and Huberdeau will end up co-scoring leaders among rookies.

Yakupov’s Sensational Stretch

As Bob Stauffer points out this morning, Yakupov has been on an unbelievable tear of late, even as the team has (mostly) struggled around him.

Nail Yakupov scored 11 goals and added 4 assists in the #Oilers final 14 games and went +7 during that stretch

Yakupov’s assist rate over both this most recent run and from the beginning of the year is basically unchanged; he posted 0.29 assists per game over his first 34 and 0.29 assists per game over his last 14. What has changed is his shooting – he’s gone from firing 1.4 shots per game to 2.4 shots per game. By eye he’s been a much better player all over the ice during this last stretch, and I think this helps confirm that in that he’s finally starting to generate shots in volume.

Also spiking was shooting percentage; after a 12.5 percent run over his first 34 games, he’s scored 11 times on 33 shots for a 33.3 percent shooting number. He’s now at 21.0 percent on the season, a number which is almost certainly too good to be true. However, the possibility at least should be considered that Yakupov could be a truly elite shooting percentage player (15.0%+) – we don’t have his shooting percentage from junior, but we know he was a better goal-scorer than Taylor Hall and a much better goal-scorer than Jordan Eberle at the same points in their careers. Of all the things that make Nail Yakupov a fantastic prospect, his shot stands out as something that is a high-end NHL weapon in the here and now; it’s just a matter of the rest of his game catching up to it.

Everything has been catching up; it’s a process but his growth as a player is undeniable. Criag MacTavish raved about his development on After Hours last night and particularly highlighted Yakupov’s willingness to put extra work in. That kind of skill married to that kind of work ethic make him a very special player.

Award Possibilities

Yakupov’s strong run over the late season has moved him into the conversation for the Calder Trophy. I think he ultimately finishes as a finalist rather than the winner simply because Jonas Brodin has been such a revelation on the Minnesota blue line. Over a full season, that might be different because the learning curve for Yakupov was steep in the early going and he hasn’t had a lot of time to make up for it, but over a shortened year I think he falls just short.

He should be on the all-rookie team, though. The three forwards on that squad will doubltess come from the group of six with 27+ points: Yakupov, Huberdeau, Conacher, Brendan Galalgher, Brandon Saad and Alex Galchenyuk. The defenders seem obvious – Brodin and Justin Schultz – and while there are three possibles for the goaltender honours Ottawa’s Robin Lehner seems the logical choice.

Jonathan Willis is a freelance writer.
He currently works for Oilers Nation, Sportsnet, the Edmonton Journal and Bleacher Report.
He's co-written three books and worked for myriad websites, including Grantland, ESPN, The Score, and Hockey Prospectus. He was previously the founder and managing editor of Copper & Blue.

Remember when DSF said Peter Mueller is better than Yakupov?
Remember when DSF said we should be following the Panthers rebuild model and that Dale Tallon is showing the Oilers how its done?
Remember when DSF guaranteed the Jackets make te playoffs after the trade deadline. I believe he exact quote was 'book it'

I'm not sure why anyone cares what he says. Flip flopping around with incoherent arguments. The only consistent item is an irrational hatred for the team.

I feel bad for DSF, he is a poor, bitter, angry lost soul. He needs a hug from OilersNation. Who spends their time in another teams fan forum critiquing every move. It really is sad.

Look at the Montreal Canadians this season. They had the balls to do what needed to be done with Scott Gomez. Why can't the Oilers do the same with their albatross, Shawn Horcoff?

The deadwood out, rookies in scenario is working wonderfully in Montreal. Why doesn't management have the balls to admit this Horcoff debacle is biting them in the arse? Geuss the difference is they have balls and or Oilers don't/unable to admit they (Katz and Lowe) made a huge mistake. Did I forget to mention balls? I' hate to omit it accidentally.

Because we don't have any other defensively capable centres who can win faceoffs. Sure Horcoff makes too much money, but I'd only amnesty buyout his contract once we are too tight against the cap. That hasn't happened yet.

Because we don't have any other defensively capable centres who can win faceoffs. Sure Horcoff makes too much money, but I'd only amnesty buyout his contract once we are too tight against the cap. That hasn't happened yet.

And Horcoff is significantly better than Gomez in my belief. Hes no superstar but he contributes to this team. I figured we should have all see that once he returned from absence earlier in the year.

Because we don't have any other defensively capable centres who can win faceoffs. Sure Horcoff makes too much money, but I'd only amnesty buyout his contract once we are too tight against the cap. That hasn't happened yet.

Horcoff plays a huge role on this team, I thought we had this conversation already back in February? I really like how he and Hall play together.. I would spend the buyouts on actual deadweight players....not role players.

Yakupov scored 10 of his 17 goals AFTER the Oilers were pretty much eliminated from the playoffs including 3 goals against a team that didn't care enough to dress their entire top line or 5 of their top 6 defensemen.

Voters will notice.

Did you miss his two goals against Mini? I am quite sure they were trying to win.

"Now, those of you following along at home will remember I told you that the Oilers should have drafted the big centre instead of Yakupov but you had all these bright shiny things distracting you and you all opted to go with the guy who has the best cell.

Too bad."

The Oilers decided to go with the best hockey player, which is Yakupov.

Nevermind the Calder trophy...your point here doesn't stand. There is more than ample evidence demonstrating the Yakupov is going to be the next Russian superstar in the NHL. You can discount his performance in the last 2 games, and his skill is still apparent, especially when outperforming most of his team during a 6 game losing skid.

Hall is sitting 9th in scoring, and Skinner is sitting at 143rd in the NHL. We all know how worthless the Calder has become so I'm not really invested in who wins.

There's never a good time to be wasteful with resources. Horcoff types you can buy at Walmart in July every summer. Kyle Wellwood can do everything Horcoff can do, at 1/4 the salary. Having this contract as a precendent does much more harm than good. Is this why the Oilers had to overpay Hall and Eberle to longterm deals, maybe a little i'd have to think.

Being up against the cap or not is irrelevant. Every article on ON needs a little Horcoff wuv.

I think you're trying to hard there Quick.. Here let me make it easier on you...Belanger, Eager, Hordichuk, Petrell.. There ya go..

Calder (top rookie): Jeff Skinner (Carolina Hurricanes) Runners-up: Logan Couture (San Jose Sharks), P.K. Subban (Montreal Canadiens)
Another fine crop of NHL rookies this season. Long-term, the Edmonton Oilers' Taylor Hall may be the best player to enter the NHL in 2010-11, but his season was cut short by injury. Skinner, meanwhile, made the Hurricanes out of training camp as an 18-year-old and responded by becoming the seventh-youngest player in history to score 30 goals. He is a dynamic finisher, reminiscent a little of the early Mike Bossy, great skating ability, good instincts, confident in his ability with the puck. Couture helped change the culture in San Jose, and by proving he could play in the No. 2 slot, permitted coach Todd McLellan to tinker with his lines, moving Dany Heatley off the Thornton unit, and shifting versatile Joe Pavelski down the charts to centre the third line to replace Manny Malhotra, who they lost in the off-season as a free agent to Vancouver. Couture went from airline commuter last year (shuffling back and forth constantly between the minors) to integral part of the team's top-six forward group; and will finish second in team goal-scoring behind only Patrick Marleau. Impressive.

I see a lot of boxcars and narratives about rising to challenges, coaching decisions and injuries...

Because we don't have any other defensively capable centres who can win faceoffs. Sure Horcoff makes too much money, but I'd only amnesty buyout his contract once we are too tight against the cap. That hasn't happened yet.

There's never a good time to be wasteful with resources. Horcoff types you can buy at Walmart in July every summer. Kyle Wellwood can do everything Horcoff can do, at 1/4 the salary. Having this contract as a precendent does much more harm than good. Is this why the Oilers had to overpay Hall and Eberle to longterm deals, maybe a little i'd have to think.

Being up against the cap or not is irrelevant. Every article on ON needs a little Horcoff wuv.

Not sure I agree with the idea that the oilers are just as bad, if not worse than they were last year.

I think Goal differential tells a better story than winning percent. It doesn't have the same effect on the standings, but it gives you a better idea of where the team really stands among the other teams around the league.

We definitely aren't a playoff team, but we almost cut our goal differential in half. -27 last year, and on pace for -15 this year. This is still awful, and I'd deem it a disappointment for sure, but there's no denying that it's an improvement from last season.

No smart Oiler fans ever expected this team to make the playoffs this year. I'd say most expected them to finish between 10-12 in the west. They finished 12th, and 24th in the league. They said their goal was to play meaningful games in april and the achieved that. They lost every single one of them mind you, but still. Next season the goal has to be the playoffs. No question. From day one. Not meaningful games, not staying in the race. Leading the race.

Prediction: 2013-14 Oilers goal differential is +5, and they finish in 7th in the west.

Ebs, Jultz and Nuge bounce back and post good offensive nbrs:

65pts, 50pts, 60pts respectively.

Yak will post 60pts
Hall will post 70pts.

Don't be surprised if we see Yakupov play on the right wing with Hall for some long stretches next season when Ebs and Hallsy go cold. By season's end, Yak may get equal TOI to Ebs. Ebs isn't all that much better than Yak IMO.

Pajaarvi, Lander and Hartikainen are still young and developing and all have great potential, plus their contracts are favourable. I would like to see them on the 3rd line together next year, I think they would be effective.

Jones is done, cut him loose. He is not what this team needs.

Belanger+ (Eager?) might be useful in bringing back something useful.

Cut Petrell loose.

Draft one of the top 3 C's.

Acquire a top- pairing D man using Hemmer, Gags and prospects if necessary and add a 2nd or 3rd pairing Dman. There should be enough depth on the roster to cover the 3rd pairing when necessary.

Acquire 2 bangers (one a C) who bring it every night and are effective in their own end and then this will be a play-off team.

"We definitely aren't a playoff team, but we almost cut our goal differential in half. -27 last year, and on pace for -15 this year. This is still awful, and I'd deem it a disappointment for sure, but there's no denying that it's an improvement from last season."

-27 over an 82 game season is -0.33 per game. -15 over a 48 game season is -0.31 per game. Not much difference. There were some positive points, but the team played remarkably similarly strength hockey the past 2 seasons.

yes, there were a lot of different scenarios where I could have moved people for mid-round picks, maybe a little higher in a couple of other circumstances, but that wasn’t my goal coming into this trade deadline. It was to find somehow to not take away from the depth of our dressing room, or the people that we’ve asked to compete so hard to get to this spot, was to show them that we trust this group, that they have a wonderful opportunity to get to the playoffs here.

Moves were there. A mid-round or higher pick for Whitney would look pretty good to Stu right now I bet.

There's never a good time to be wasteful with resources. Horcoff types you can buy at Walmart in July every summer. Kyle Wellwood can do everything Horcoff can do, at 1/4 the salary. Having this contract as a precendent does much more harm than good. Is this why the Oilers had to overpay Hall and Eberle to longterm deals, maybe a little i'd have to think.

Being up against the cap or not is irrelevant. Every article on ON needs a little Horcoff wuv.

I think it's safe to say Eberle is not overpaid. We're talking about a player who can put up 76 points in a season.

Jones can put up 15 goals on the third line.
Brown does his job as well as anyone.
Horcoff is a good role player who will take less money when we are up against the cap.

Hemsky is done, Gagner is worth more in a trade than he is on the ice. Gags' trade value may never be this high again, and he was still on the ice for way too many chances against this year.
Pajaarvi is big, fast, but soft and just can't seem to figure out how to play hard.

If you ask me, Yak scored the most goals of any rookie, and when the games mattered he got better and better. The rest of the team didn't, but he did.

Nonsense.

Yakupov scored 10 of his 17 goals AFTER the Oilers were pretty much eliminated from the playoffs including 3 goals against a team that didn't care enough to dress their entire top line or 5 of their top 6 defensemen.

1) Barring beyond exceptional play, it is highly unlikely to go to a D. Cross off Schultz and Brodin.

2) It is highly unlikely the voters bother with anything beyond "saw him good" and boxcars. Cross off any P/60 5x5; corsirel; qualcomp arguments.

3) It is highly unlikely to go to a forward who put up less points on the table.

That basically leaves Yakupov and Huberdeau.

If they sour on both (anti Oiler/anti Russian/anti celebration vs. anti +/- bias), I'd look at Saad or Gallagher.

Saad is big and got a lot of CHI coverage this year. Gallagher is in a huge market and gets a lot of press for his moxy, which gets the "good canadian kid" seal of approval as opposed to the Russian diss).

So, of the three are we getting / taking Monahan, Gauthier, or Nurse? Gautheir is definitely a draft for need, though he did look good in the Under 18's. Monahan is arguably the BPA, and Nurse will be a project, and we already have that guy in Tuebert.

With any luck someone ahead of us with grab Nurse as this year's Reinhart pick and leave one of Monahan or Lindholm for us.

I will let good players drop due to the "Russian factor" all day long. Forgetting about Galchenyuck for a moment, do you see any of "the Russian factor" in Yakupov? The kid works hard, plays physical, and apparently has a great attitude.

Nishkenin is rightly being compared to Malkin. Russian factor or not, if Edmonton lands the next Malkin, that is going to make our top two lines as deep and deadly as any in the league.

Having said that I do hope very much we can get a big two way centre, as Magnus and Yak seem to be having some good chemistry lately.

If Yakupov doesn't win the Calder, it just confirms there's a whole lotta personal bias/discrimination involved.

That's my belief, and i'm sticking with it.

As the season went on Nail got stronger. Hardest working kid on this hockey club the whole season. The first year kid leads the way as far as fitness went, left the vets who should know better in the dust. Nail continued to get better while the rest of the rookies in this leahue tailed off. Hopefully it starts to rub off on the guys who are back next season.

If Yakupov doesn't win the Calder, it just confirms there's a whole lotta personal bias/discrimination involved.

That's my belief, and i'm sticking with it.

As the season went on Nail got stronger. Hardest working kid on this hockey club the whole season. The first year kid leads the way as far as fitness went, left the vets who should know better in the dust. Nail continued to get better while the rest of the rookies in this leahue tailed off. Hopefully it starts to rub off on the guys who are back next season.

Guy is a beast.Watch his off ice workouts- he is crazy intense. Focussed like a laser beam on becoming better. Natural gifts and single-minded about improving them -nice combination. He is a keeper- wasn't sure at first but now I believe he will be the best of the three #1s. And after watching Hall this season, that would be amazing.

"You can discount his performance in the last 2 games, and his skill is still apparent, especially when outperforming most of his team during a 6 game losing skid."

Are you kidding me Vancouver quit halfway through the 3rd period. It was not a NHL game

You didn't read the post right. nrXic said you CAN discount the last two games. That means you don't consider the last two games. When he said "outperformed most of HIS team" it means Yakupov played better than other Oilers, not the other team. Any comparison to the other team is invalid here.

Poor argument, poor post!

But DSF, hilarious for agreeing! Good one buddy!!! Well played scarcasim!!!

The argument that Yakupov didn't produce as well 5 vs 5 is a little misleading if you factor in his linemates for much of the year. Also, 5 vs 4 time is earned, and Yak and Schultz clearly earned it, whereas Gallagher and Galchenyuk didn't. Goals scored on PP still help win games, at least when I last checked.

Because he scored 4 more points with 3 of those coming during the final game of the season against the Chicago Wolves?

Hardly convincing evidence."

Both you and Sammy should learn to read more carefully, I clearly said:

"You can discount his performance in the last 2 games"

Read it again.

Sammy, did you get a chance to read it again as well?

Now consider that in the 10 games prior to that, where the Oilers went 1-9, that Nail was one of the better performers going 3-3-6 and sitting at minus-1 despite being outscored greatly as a team during that stretch.

Sorry for being harsh but not reading carefully and spouting off an irrelevant reply is one of my pet-peeves, and both of you did just that.

I'll be surprised if he's even a finalists. It's almost a guarantee all finalists will be from the east as the east didn't play against the west. There will be more proof of the eastern media's Oilers hatred.

Look at the Montreal Canadians this season. They had the balls to do what needed to be done with Scott Gomez. Why can't the Oilers do the same with their albatross, Shawn Horcoff?

The deadwood out, rookies in scenario is working wonderfully in Montreal. Why doesn't management have the balls to admit this Horcoff debacle is biting them in the arse? Geuss the difference is they have balls and or Oilers don't/unable to admit they (Katz and Lowe) made a huge mistake. Did I forget to mention balls? I' hate to omit it accidentally.

I think the fact that he has been tearing it up the last 15 games while most of the team he's on gave up 15 games ago, should be enough too get him the Calder , Brodin is paired with an allstar in Suter on a really good defensive team, and Huberdau had a good rookie campaign I just think Yak had some bigger moments and scored more goals and a better (+)(-) then him. So he's most deserving, I wouldn't have said that 10 games ago but he's really impressed me lately.

Tied for 1st in rookie points.
Leads all rookies in goals.
Is +11 better than the co leader J.Huberdeau.
Leads in sh%
2:22 min less toi/g than Huberdeau.

Brodin has been logging 23+ mins per game for Minnesota, but I haven't paid any real attention to his game so I have no idea why he is so valuable. Must just be a great shutdown guy. Doesn't seem to have great offensive upside based on his stat line though, 11pts in 45 games, +3.

Jones can put up 15 goals on the third line.
Brown does his job as well as anyone.
Horcoff is a good role player who will take less money when we are up against the cap.

Hemsky is done, Gagner is worth more in a trade than he is on the ice. Gags' trade value may never be this high again, and he was still on the ice for way too many chances against this year.
Pajaarvi is big, fast, but soft and just can't seem to figure out how to play hard.

Cudos to Yakupov for strong finish , and he should be rookie of the year potential . Off topic : Some veterans have been out of playoffs for so long they have either forgotten how to escalate their games , or just no longer capable of it . It showed markedly during the losing streak as they were unable to show that consistent commitment - only talk of it was about all they in reality did .

I think shot differential and 5 vs 5 goal +/- are much more telling than a simple GF/GA stat.

The team will improve in this area with experience alone in the top 6, however it is the bottom 6 and our bottom 2 D that have been the killers. This is where things need to dramatically improve.

It is now time to get rid of Gagner and Hemsky while their value is so high. Sure lots of time has been invested in Sam, but it became clearer as the season went on that he just does not "bring it". He had a great start, but I think this was due to his stint in Europe, which gave him a headstart. If someone were to do an analysis on his season, I bet it will be be crystal clear that he faded really bad in the last half. I just did not see him be effective in his own end, and he seemed to really struggle to do anything in the O zone. Sure he still collected points, but I think many of the assists were secondary and it was his wingers who were the driving force.

Horcoff plays a huge role on this team, I thought we had this conversation already back in February? I really like how he and Hall play together.. I would spend the buyouts on actual deadweight players....not role players.

Yes Horcoff is a useful player and that's been discussed a lot. The problem with buying out the "Deadweight players" is that their cap hits are much lower. Horcoff's cap hit is 5.5 for the next two years. After next season we"ll have to pay both Nuge and J. Schultz. With the cap lowering I can't see us being able to afford Horcoff's cap hit. I also doubt we could afford to re sign Hemsky and keep Horcoff. Who would you rather have on the team?